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Oktoberfest

Any event that requires us both to drink beer and listen to some good live music goes down as a clear winner in XelaWho´s books.

So we are most excited that there will be some Oktoberfest celebrations in Xela this year, courtesy of El Cuartito. From Friday 3rd to Sunday 5th of October there will live music all day from a variety of different bands and a range of international beers from all around the world for you to try. There will even be traditional German sausages, bratwurst, on sale to soak up all the booze.

As per usual Oktoberfest celebrations, you will be expected to stumble your way home using a friend´s shoulder for support.

F lo p p i n g

Claro Que No

Dear Claro,

We would like to know where you are hiding our saldo please. Have you been saving it for us as a special Christmas present? Or have you just decided that we have been spending too much time communicating with people as of late and that you needed to give us a helpful nudge to become more antisocial?

We find it strange that our Q25 of saldo is now only lasting a couple of short phone calls and a few texts, when you seem to be perfectly capable of affording to bombard our phones with 10 utterly pointless messages a day for free. Although, having said that, we do also admit that receiving so many text messages does often have its advantages – it makes us look much more popular than we actually are when our phone keeps going off in public. So let´s not break off our BFF relationship quite yet – just sort it out and this little spat will be over. It´s such a pain to change phone numbers anyway.

Yours sincerely,

XelaWho (& the rest of the population of Xela).

BIG BROTHER: COMING TO A SOCIAL NETWORK NEAR YOU

After their humiliation over the Ley Monsanto scandal, one would have thought that Guatemala’s leaders would have perhaps learned an important lesson about trying to push through ridiculous laws with no prior public consultation. It would appear not.

Next up on the cards we have a proposed law to regulate “morality & dignity” (whatever that means) on social networks. The proposal would make “discrediting, scorning, defaming, threatening or discriminating” against people online open to criminal prosecution.

Of course, racism and threats issued against others online are serious issues. But, in the vast majority of cases, this is behaviour that is not permitted under the terms-of-use of social networks anyway, and so there is really no need to bring in draconian laws that threaten one of the most important civic and political rights under the false pretence of combating such problems. And after the scorn, discrediting and defaming that was thrown on Guatemala’s politicians online over their support for the Ley Monsanto, it’s not too difficult to see where the real reason they want to pass this law lies.

Social networks have quickly become the medium through which Guatemalan citizens disillusioned with their country´s politics can vent their anger and frustration. It´s not uncommon to read insults such as “payaso”, “pendejo” and “hijo de la gran…” thrown at Guatemala´s politicians online, and often not without good reason. Guatemala´s leaders may not like it, but instead of making insulting them a criminal offence, why don´t they actually try removing the need to throw such insults at them in the first place?